"Black Elephant in the Room": Black Students Contextualizing Campus Racial Climate Within the U.S. Racial Climate

• In Event: 68.031 - "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised": Contested Terrain, Student Activism, and Racial Campus Climates

Abstract

The systemic racism in U.S. society being resisted through larger movements such as Black Lives Matter is also reflected and reproduced in U.S. higher education institutions. Black students are seeing and experiencing their racialized identities being connected to broader systems of oppression within higher education and U.S. society. This qualitative study examines how Black students at predominantly White institutions contextualize their campus racial climate within broader race issues, tensions, and movements occurring across the nation. Findings are organized around four themes: 1) Perceptions of Blackness on campus; 2) Campus racial climate mirroring societal racial climate; 3) Experiencing and engaging in movements on campus; 4) Impact of racial climate on future planning.

Authors

• Chrystal George Mwangi, University of Massachusetts - Amherst

• Barbara Thelamour, The College of Wooster

• Ijeoma Ezeofor, University of Maryland - College Park

• Ashley Carpenter, University of Massachusetts - Amherst